Brian Johnson Space: 1999 Eagle Interview
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 1 ต.ค. 2024
- Watch our latest interview with multi-award winning Special Effects Designer Brian Johnson as he talks through one of our favourite model miniatures from the Prop Store 2021 London Entertainment Live Auction - an original screen-matched large-scale eagle transporter filming miniature.
Eagle Transporter model miniatures were the primary spacecraft on Moonbase Alpha, used for exploration, transportation and combat. This transporter appeared in 45 of Space: 1999's 48 episodes, making it the most screen-used model of the series, and it screen-matches the Eagle seen in series finale "The Dorcons", through its markings and details on the bottom of the footpads. It was also used in nine of the 11 crash-landing sequences, meaning it had to be repeatedly rebuilt and repaired. In recent years it has been lovingly and carefully restored by master model maker David Sisson.
Husband-and-wife team Gerry and Sylvia Anderson created the live-action show Space: 1999, having previously collaborated on their "Supermarionation" puppet-based shows, including Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons and Joe 90. For Space: 1999, they drew visual inspiration from Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. Special effects designer and Academy Award®-winner Brian Johnson, who had worked on 2001, designed the Eagle Transporters. They were built in four sizes: 44", 22", 11" and 5" in length. Although two other 44" models were eventually built, this is the original 44" model used primarily for medium and close-up photography - such as take-off, landing and crashing shots - and appeared prominently in the show's opening credits.
The model is made largely of resin and wood, with a brass frame, moveable metal feet and propulsion engines on its underside. The passenger pod is hand-painted in varying shades of grey, giving the impression of different panels. It has four doors, one on each side, which do not open. Small transfers, featuring serial numbers and the Moonbase Alpha insignia, give added detail and realism. The model's various sections are detachable, including the feet, main frame, pod, and cockpit, which reveals two model pilots when removed. Sisson repaired the brass frame holding the Eagle together, stripping it down and resoldering it. He also stripped down paintwork which had been applied subsequent to production, revealing original detailing, before carefully applying new paintwork in some areas.
This amazing item and over 1000 other items of iconic movie history are going up for sale in the Prop Store London 2021 Entertainment Memorabilia Live Auction on the 9th-11th November. Find out more about this item now over at propstore.com/liveauction.
What a treat to see Brian Johnson reunited again with the original Eagle 1 !! Thanks for posting this!
One of the most awesome spaceship design ever
As a kid I recorded Space:1999 episodes on our old top-load VCR. I couldn't see the wires then - and my imagination doesn't allow me to see them now on Blu-Ray. Thanks Brian Johnson for the great memories, and the fantasy of such a wonderful model over these last decades.
In my opinion, the Eagle is the best looking spacecraft, in fiction or reality. I wish I could afford to bid on this.
Same here!
and being gritty and dirtied up added realism to whole ship
The liberator is no.1 for me, this no.2
I've always thought this was one of the coolest designs ever done. Loved the show too.
Small but Awesome Interview This Guy is Amazing and the Eagle Model is my all time Favourite model.
Great to watch and listen. I'm sure no one is pointing fingers at lines visible today in 4K. This model is superior in the show and overshines by far such small details.
Amazing guy
the Eagle is THE best Near future space vehicle there is
Brian Johnson did a schools program segment on the bbc, on making prop spaceships and weapons that taught me more about arts and crafts - in a ten minute segment - than I did in 13 years of school.
I should sell the 1/4 scale Bell Chopper I have from The Matrix. It's the original made to fine detail in blown up condition. There was only one take so it's definitely in the film.
2001, 1999, and Alien Bryan amazed me with some awesome space craft, most of those ships met with scary times in space..
Along with the Starship Enterprise, The Millennium Falcon and the Jupiter 2 the Eagle is definitely one of the most iconic and recognizable spaceship designs in all of TV and film. For those of a certain age I'd also throw in the Battlestar, Galactica. An interesting story is that the original design of the Millennium Falcon looked - completely coincidentally - very similar to the Eagle, which was being designed for Star Wars around the same time that Space:1999 was showing in the trade papers and magazines before airing. The Star Wars model makers rightfully decided that, just to be safe and not accused of copying, they should modify the Falcon to look completely different, so they took the cockpit module that would have been arranged like the Eagle in the front and attached it to the side and made the body of the ship more saucer-like. The rest, as they say, is history!
Just wow!
THE best looking spacecraft ever.
functional too realistic
Great looking and realistic too, because I imagine that to save weight etc they actually would use a "support cage" type of construction like the Eagle.
@@JustWasted3HoursHere I, to this day, say that they would be viable spacecraft today.
@@Cornz38 Agreed. Look at the NASA lunar lander. It is as barebones as possible to reduce weight. Exactly what the Eagle has done. I wonder if Brian Johnson had that in mind when he designed it.
@@JustWasted3HoursHere It's the scaffolding pole body, a cockpit and engines and that's it. It's beauty is in its simplicity. No stupid "warp" engines, just good old chemical rockets.
This (the Eagle space craft) is perhaps one of the greatest TV model designs of all time.
Don't change a thing ,"It's perfect",..........Spitfire test flight ....... Eagle 1 ,Project Artimis here's your Moon transport ....no design requirements it's perfect
I call my’ fleet vehicle’ ‘Eagle 4’, with a die cast eagle on the dash board. I have always loved the design and Brian and his wonderful team from the time.
LOVE space 1999 and all the 21ST CENTURY PRODUCTIONS AP FILMS
Forever love for the Eagle. Any idea why the relaunch of this franchise never sadly sees the light of day?
Went to space models near Heathrow as a keen model maker to see if I could get an apprenticeship there many years ago.
You know I never realized there were only 2 thrusters firing in VTOL flight! My mind "filled in" all 4 landing thrusters being on! Each and every time! Any one else?
My all time favourite space craft
interesting the models where reused, because they was one on the running joke/gages, the amount of eagles, crashed inthe making of the show, if they where cut off, from replacement supplies, but they always seamed load of eagles available to fly? so maybe the where reusable after crash, too?
Such a beautiful craft. Absolutely iconic!
As a kid in the 80s I had a neighbour who was roughly the same age named 'Mark' who claimed that his grandfather worked on the Spaceships of Space 1999 (The Eagles) and movie Alien (The Nostromo). Mark actually looked very similar to Brian Johnson above but I cannot remember Mark's surname to see if he was related to Brian in the video. I remember Mark lived with his natural mother, his stepfather and his smaller brother 'John' and little infant sister 'Rebecca' whose biological father were the stepfather; Mark's real biological father had been killed in a car crash he told me and may have been Irish (not sure, this was circa 1985). Mark lived with in the house behind me in a Preston suburb of Lostock Hall. Just wondering if anyone knows if Mark the kid I knew is Brian Johnson's grandchild ? the entire search is maybe complicated by the fact that Brian Johnson at one point changed his name from Brian Johncock, dunno if he did that in his youth or later in life. I remember Mark looking remarkably similar to Brian Johnson in the video above and also Mark owned a Dragon 32 8-bit home computer. Just wondering if Mark is Brian Johnson's grandfather, anyone know anything ?
Brian Johnson might have been too young in the 80s to have had a grandchild…but that’s just me guessing.
@@richardvinsen2385 He was born in 1939
Maybe the nephew’s name inspired the alien Hawk Mark 9 in Space 1999!
@@1maico1 It's a mystery that probably will never be solved. I believe I contacted either the guy direct on Facebook or some other guy who deals with his Facebook page or something and they told me that they will get back to me and they never did.
That space ship alone is real cult classic.
Un grand merci à vous d'avoir invité et interviewé ce grand artiste des effets spéciaux qu'est Brian Johnson! Le Moon bus de 2001 et le Moon hopper du SHADO dans UFO pourraient bien être des modèles antérieurs de l'Eagle... la peinture de Chris Foss d'après le design de Brian également. "The Eagle was originally named the MTU (Multiple Transportation Unit), "a workhorse, a thoroughly utilitarian spacecraft." Here is an early Chris Foss version, based on Brian Johnson's design. Johnson told TV Sci-Fi Monthly in 1976 "The Eagle was based on a kind of grass-hopper shape which just sort of grew. It was considerably shorter before we started filming, but later it elongated." The Foss painting here shows the command module, leg pods and framework, but there is no discernible passenger module section." En tant que simple fan de SF et des séries de Gerry Anderson en particulier, l'Eagle reste pour moi le plus réaliste et le plus esthétique vaisseau jamais conçu. Merci à vous, Brian!!!
I was in my twenties when the show aired here in the uk. I had watched most of Gerry anderson programmes from four feather falls onwards. This is definitely my favourite spacecraft, it still looks amazing
The Eagle is probably the most realistic sci-fi ship that could be used in reality. Yes, some changes would need to be made, but overall it's perfect as is for a low gravity transport to the lunar surface or for asteroid mining use. In the plans and reality, the ship would be 100 feet in length, and the cargo/passenger module section would be about the size of two 48-53 foot shipping containers side by side. It would work with Starship, as the cargo module would fit.
i am lucky enough to have Brains Autographed photo hanging with pride in my man cave (:
Beautiful effects in this series just too bad the science was dreadful. If only the Andersons had budgeted for a science advisor.
Thank you, Brian, for the many good days you gave me as a kid 👍
This is wonderful. Thank you.
So kool.